The Village Education Project

The Village Education Project is a non-profit organization originally started by a Swarthmore College student, and it serves to provide free education for those who are in desperate need. It currently serves the communities of La Joya, Chuchuqui, and Mojandita, which are rural, indigenous pueblos outside of the city of Otavalo. Volunteers come every summer to teach summer classes which supplement the previous year’s curriculum and help prepare students for the coming year. Those students who perform well on their final exam at the end of the summer are granted a scholarship to attend school for the entire coming year.

This blog (the posts above) will detail my summer in Otavalo, volunteering for the Village Education Project. While I will be planning curriculum and teaching classes for a good part of the day, I will also be starting research that should jumpstart a long and arduous project. This project is the dream of The Village Education Project: to build a permanent school of our own. Once we have a permanent school, we will no longer need to contract with other schools around Otavalo, but we will be centralized, and will be able to help a lot more children even more thoroughly.

To find out more about The Village Education Project, you can also visit http://www.villageeducationproject.blogspot.com.

Sincerely Yours,
Amber Wantman
Swarthmore College ’10